Wanderlust
by twenty ducats
Summary: In which Shirona/Cynthia tells the story of her life: from a tiny town struggling to keep the outside out, to the Pokemon League and fame. Rated for later chapters.
1. Prologue

"_Hey, Shirona," my friend asks me. "Do you have any pets?"_

_I look up from the ground to meet her eyes. "Yeah, I have a riolu."_

"_You're so lucky!" she squeals, eyes getting wide. "Those things are so cute! I've always wanted one."_

"_Well, they are the kind of pet everyone wants to have," I reply, "but they're kind of hard to take care of sometimes. They're really demanding."_

"_I think I could handle that." The words of a girl who'd never owned a riolu. "How old is he?"_

"_I've had him for about half a year, and when I got him, he was…" I pause to do the math. "About a year and a quarter, I think."_

"_And he still hasn't evolved? Doesn't he like you much?"_

"_Oh, he's quite fond of me, I think. But I never take him into battles…"_

"_Why not?"_

"_I think it's kind of mean, don't you? Making your pokémon fight and stuff…isn't it unfair? What if they don't want to?"_

_She looks at me like I'm crazy. "Are you kidding? They don't get seriously hurt or anything. And from what I can tell, it helps them bond with their trainer, and mature. And it's natural behavior for them."_

"_I know, I've heard all that before. I still don't like it, though."_

"_Boy…if you don't battle, and you don't take any after-school activities, what _do _you do in your free time, Shirona?"_

"_Help my grandma, mostly. I play the piano as much as I can…"_

"_You really impress me. You're at the top of the pack in music class, aren't you?"_

"_I guess so…I mean, I get good grades."_

"_Well, I know what." At this point my friend stops walking to look me straight in the eye. "Why don't we have a pokémon battle? My little shinx would probably be a good match against your riolu."_

"_Today? It's getting awful late." On the horizon, the sun looks like it's sinking into the asphalt, staining the sky pink and red and orange. We're almost to my house by now—I spent the afternoon at her place._

"_You're right. How about tomorrow, then?"_

"_Well…" I consider. I don't want to put my riolu in a battle he doesn't want to fight. But there's really no harm in letting him choose: if he wants to battle, then it should be fine. "I guess so. What harm could it do?"_

"_That's the spirit, Shirona! So we'll do it after school tomorrow."_

"_Sounds good!"_


	2. Chapter 1

My father was the son of the Celestic village elder, and my mother was a woman of the same town. I never knew either of them well, but I am told that my mother was a kind woman, and my father, while a little gruff, was warm once you earned his trust. They met at the village meetings, where they would always stare at each other from across the room. From what I understand, it was a while before they actually spoke to each other.

Eventually, they were married, and had a child: me. Tragically, though, my mother died giving birth to me. My father, heartbroken, insisted that his mother take care of me. She argued, but eventually gave in, seeing how much her son had suffered. So I was raised by my grandmother, and while I saw my father often, he was like a stranger to me. Just another villager.

My grandmother was a wise and understanding woman. The things she taught me have stuck with me for all of my life. When she gave me advice, it was not the words of others, but her own, taken from her childhood. I learned to read her face and see when her inner child was speaking; when it was, I would ask her, "Why do you say that?" She would give me a knowing smile, seeing right through me, and tell me a story from her youth.

Her storytelling ability was not exclusive to ones from her own life. Like any grandmother, she would tell me stories when I was young. However, these stories were not the kind most children heard. I grew up on the mythology of Sinnoh that was so deeply ingrained into the culture of Celestic. Urban children heard the story of Hansel and Gretel, the children who were lured into a Mismagius' illusion; my grandmother told me of the battle between the ancients, Kyogre and Groudon. They heard of the errors of the man from Veilstone; I heard how the Original One created the universe. I found her stories fascinating.

One experience that shaped me happened when I was eight years old. I had heard something about the three Lakes of Sinnoh, and I asked my grandmother what was so special about them.

"Oh, they are perhaps the most special lakes you'll ever find!" she laughed. "My dear, do you remember when I told you about Mesprit, Uxie and Azelf?"

My brow furrowed. "Yeah. I thought they were just stories, though."

My grandmother gave me a mysterious smile, shaking her head. "Every story stems from the truth."

"So…they really _are_ real?" I asked, eyes wide. Then I narrowed them again. "I don't know if I can believe that…"

"I can show you, if you wish."

My eyebrows rose so high, it felt like they would come off my face. "What do you mean?"

"You'll see, dear."

Saying no more, she took me by the hand and led me out of the old wooden house we lived in. We walked for quite a while, and as we went, I tried to imagine what she could possibly want to show me. My imagination began to run wild, inventing all sorts of ridiculous things about the fairy pokémon we had discussed.

We came to a set of old, wooden stairs that were being overgrown with grass. It had rained the night before, so we had to be careful as we walked down them. While old age had done little to my grandmother's character, it was beginning to slow her body down. She took each step carefully while I ran ahead, becoming impatient.

At the bottom of the steps was a clearing I had been to often before. It was full of long grass and some flowers, too; I loved to play in it. Was this the place she'd wanted to show me? I saw it at least once a week; what could be so special about it?

Instead we kept walking, and finally came to a rock wall. There was a small, small hole in the stone, but for the life of me I couldn't see what was inside. I stuck my head inside and squinted, but it was pitch dark. My grandmother smiled.

"Go on inside," she said, pushing on my back a little to encourage me. Not being fond of the dark, I was reluctant, but my curiosity overcame my nervousness and I climbed inside, Grandmother following me carefully. When we were inside, she knelt down and groped around for a few moments before finding something. When she held it to the light, I saw that it was an old lantern with a candle inside, and a box of matches. She struck a match and lit the candle with it. I gasped.

Now, with the light, I could see that the damp walls of the cave were not bare stone as I had thought, but were covered in drawings. I ran up to one wall and stared at the drawings: they were crude pictures of pokémon and people. In some pictures, the two were standing side by side; other times, the humans were holding spears and the pokémon were at their feet, or running away. _Hunting?_ I wondered.

"These pictures were painted by an ancient tribe who lived in this town long, long ago," Grandmother explained, walking up behind me and bathing the walls with light. "Everyone in this village is descended from these people."

I turned to her, eyes wide. "Really?"

She nodded, smiling, and I ran off again to look at all the pictures on the walls. I was in awe: nothing here was like anything I'd ever seen before, not even the ancient pictures of Legendary pokémon my grandmother had shown me in her books. I was so amazed, in fact, that it was nearly ten minutes before I remembered why I had come here. I turned to my grandmother, asking her what Mesprit, Uxie and Azelf and the lakes had to do with this. She just chuckled and started walking deeper into the cave, beckoning me to follow. I did.

When we came to the back of the cave, she held the lantern up higher and pointed to the wall. Painted on the rock was a picture of three pokémon forming a triangle. They all had long tails with gemstones on them, and funny-looking heads. They looked like fairies.

Fairies…?

"Grandma!" I shouted suddenly. "Are these pokémon the ones you were talking about?"

She nodded, smiling. "They are Mesprit, the being of emotion; Uxie, the being of knowledge; and Azelf, the being of willpower. Long ago, our ancestors saw these pokémon, and painted them on this wall." She turned to me, eyes glittering. "Do you believe me now, Shirona?"

I could only nod back.

Less then a year later, when I was nine, I saw a side of my grandmother that I never knew existed. What I saw was her anger. She was normally a kind and forgiving person, but when something bothered her, or when I misbehaved, she became stern. However, I had never seen her lose control and really rage until that time.

When I was a child, Sinnoh was beginning to pick up on the pokémon training trend. It had become popular quickly among the younger set, spreading even to Celestic, but Sinnoh still refused to establish a Pokémon Trainers' League, like Kanto, Johto and Hoenn had done before. Apparently, the government didn't agree to the international League standards, so having signed the agreement with the other three countries, they couldn't legally establish a League, or even Pokémon Gyms. There was a major uproar among the population, and finally the government gave in, creating a series of eight Pokémon Gyms complying with the standards of the alliance. This happened about a year and a half after I was born.

However, one of the Gyms was established in the city of Eterna. Since Eterna is right on the other side of Mt. Coronet from Celestic, Trainers started passing through Celestic to go through or over the mountain to get to Eterna. My grandmother was always grumbling about the travelers, saying that they have no respect for the town, that they just pass through without giving it a second look and not watching where they're stepping. I thought the people were interesting—I had never left the village before, and these strange people were something I had never seen before. When groups of them passed by (and when Grandmother wasn't looking), I would open the window and stick my head out to stare at them.

Soon, Trainers gathered outside the town and started having battles on a regular basis. They demanded that our local shop carry items to heal their pokémon, which the village elders grudgingly agreed to. But, when I was nine years old, the trainers decided that this wasn't enough, and sent a request to the League. Officials came two weeks later, demanding that a Pokémon Center be established in our town.

My grandmother refused angrily, saying that our village was a relic from ancient times. "Who do you think _you_ are," she would demand loudly, "to order _us_ to defile it with your modern junk? What happened to the government's promise to let us keep our village as is?"

"Things have changed, ma'am," the League man in the fancy suit would reply. "Our superiors—"

"I'll _say_ things have changed!" my grandmother would yell. "When I was a girl, people had respect for their origins! They _cared_ that this village had a history! Back then, people like you didn't exist! Has your obsession with your stupid pokémon battles completely overtaken your judgment?"

I didn't understand what was going on back then. I didn't know what a Pokémon Center was, or how it would "poison" our village. All I knew was that my grandmother fought long and hard, day and night, to keep the Center out.

She lost.

They finally scheduled a meeting between the village council and the League officials. It lasted a long time, but I didn't know what was happening, because Grandmother wouldn't allow me to come. I argued and protested, but she insisted that I stay at home. I didn't want to follow her, but I had no intention of rotting inside all day, so as soon as she was gone, I went outside and started irritably pulling up grass with my fists.

When she came home, she looked like she had suddenly aged ten years. Her face was tired, and she sagged hopelessly. She ushered me inside without a word.

The next day, I woke up to the loudest noises I'd ever heard. There was banging and crashing and hammering outside my window, and when I looked out, I saw the skeleton of a building being erected maybe fifty meters from our home. I went to ask my grandmother what was going on, but she looked like she was in a bad mood, so I didn't bother her. Then I realized that they must be building the Pokémon Center.

My grandmother didn't just sit around during the construction, though. Every day, she would go out and give the workers a hard time. At first I thought she was doing the right thing, but I started to feel bad for the workers a little.

A year or two later, the officials came back, requesting that a PokéMart be built also. She refused, like last time, and I became involved too. This time we won, because the local shop already sold quite a few of PokéMart's signature items. It was a victory for the town, and it was when I finally began to understand what it meant to be a resident of Celestic—and the elder's granddaughter.


	3. Chapter 2

Thank you all for the feedback you've given me. I'm flattered by how well this has gone over.

This chapter is even longer than the last one. I hope it doesn't bore you.

* * *

The only way I've ever been able to truly achieve, is when I can pour my heart into it; when it's something I love. If I truly, whole-heartedly enjoy what I do, then I can rise up and above expectations and records in the field. When I don't enjoy it, I always fall short. It's simply the way I am.

There are two things that meet my criteria for personal success: music and pokémon battling. When I was young, I was always told that I excelled in these subjects, that I was far more talented than almost all of my peers. No adult at the time understood that my achievements did not stem from talent. I loved the piano since I first laid my small fingers on the keys; as soon as I tasted a pokémon battle for the first time, I was addicted. I practiced every hour of every day that I could manage. What I had was passion.

Music came to me first. My grandmother regularly makes visits to the citizens of Celestic. It's a very small town, so she knows all of them personally. When I was about five, she decided to take me along, and we visited a man who had moved to Celestic long before I was born. My grandmother was somewhat wary of him when he moved here, assuming that he would be disrespectful of the culture of Celestic, but he turned out to be just the opposite. He had said that he came to Celestic to escape the chaos of the modern world.

However, he'd brought a few things from the outside world with him, one of which was an old wooden piano he was particularly fond of. On my first visit, I had no idea what it was, so I walked up to it and put my hand on the keys. To my great surprise, there was a loud, disharmonious noise when I pressed them down. I withdrew my hand and skittered away from the piano as if it had injured me. The man we were visiting laughed good-naturedly.

"It's a piano," he explained. "If you press down the keys, they make sound, and you can make music on it." He sat down at the bench, and asked me if I would like to hear him play something. I nodded emphatically, and he began to play.

I was mesmerized. The sound was like nothing I'd ever heard before. Our village had music, of course; beautiful music, played with traditional instruments or sung. But this sound had a quality the likes of which I had never heard before. Each note rang, almost like a bell, and the music flowed and carried me out of my body for a moment. The song was like a living thing: it went as it pleased, and the musician was the instrument, bringing it to life.

When the music stopped playing, I missed it. I asked the man if he would let me play. He smiled, and said, "Sure! I can show you how to do it. That is, if it's okay with your grandma here." He looked at Grandmother.

She nodded, also smiling. "Of course."

I put my hand on the piano keys and pushed them down. I winced; the sound was as discordant as the last time. How was I supposed to make the kind of music he did?

"Here, I'll show you," he said. He told me where to put my fingers, and placed his hand on top of mine, demonstrating how to push down the keys to make a good sound. We tried it several times, then he let my do it on my own. The sound was much nicer, but the hand position hurt my fingers a little.

I fiddled around for a few more minutes, until Grandmother said that we couldn't possibly impose upon his hospitality any longer, and we left. I waved goodbye to him from outside, and hummed the song all the way home.

Every time we visited him, I would spend the last fifteen minutes or so taking piano lessons. Soon I would jump for joy whenever my grandmother would tell me that we were going to visit him. When she thought I was out of earshot, she would insist to him that she needed to repay him somehow for the lessons. He always refused.

"It's my pleasure to be teaching her," he would reply. "My reward is passing on what I know to someone with the enthusiasm to become really great."

Eventually, I did. I practiced hard, and my love for the instrument grew with my talent. My teacher always praised me on how quickly and how much I was improving. My grandmother even invested in a piano for our home so that I could practice. She said she was glad I had found a medium through which I could channel the creativity she had always seen in me. I only knew that I was having a lot of fun.

Between school, piano and my duties as the Elder's granddaughter, my schedule was relatively full. But I was fine with that—I enjoyed the things I did, and I never really thought about taking up other hobbies. Pokémon battling in particular was something I stayed away from, for a variety of reasons. I always thought that it was kind of mean: making pokémon fight each other for the Trainers' entertainment seemed cruel to me. In addition, my grandmother was against it. It was easy to understand why, if you knew about the events with the new Gym Leader system and the Pokémon Center.

However, at school, I met a girl Saeko. More people had begun to move to Celestic; Saeko was from Eterna. She was a pokémon Trainer, and despite what Grandmother said about Trainers, I found that Saeko was nice. We became friends quickly. We would help each other with schoolwork, and eventually she invited me to her house. I asked Grandmother if I could go. She was reluctant at first.

"Isn't that girl a Trainer from Eterna?" she asked me, frowning. "I don't want you getting any ideas about battling from being around her."

"It won't happen, Grandma, I promise," I replied. "I don't want to be a Trainer any more than you do."

She stared at me for a moment, as if trying to read my intentions, then nodded. "All right. You can go."

I beamed. "Thank you, Grandma! Can you feed Riri while I'm out?"

"Of course." Riri was my riolu. I found him wandering around in the village square one day. I had no idea how he'd gotten there, but took him home and Grandmother decided that I could keep him. He became the family pet, and I admit that I did baby him.

I went over to her house that day, and as we gradually became closer, I began to visit her more often. I didn't know whether my grandmother would want her over at our house, though. She seemed to approve of our friendship, but I don't know the extent to which she would allow us to be together, so I never asked.

One day when she was walking home with me, though, the conversation somehow turned to pokémon battling.

"Well I know what. Why don't we have a pokémon battle?" she asked me. "My little shinx would probably be a good match against your riolu."

Suddenly I got nervous. I wasn't supposed to have anything to do with pokémon battling. Even though I didn't like it much, it sounded a little interesting from the things she'd told me. I would be in unbelievable amounts of trouble if I agreed and Grandmother found out. But Saeko looked so eager—how could I refuse her?

I realized that I could just say "I guess so", and give myself some actual time to think about it. If I decided not to, I could always say that Riri doesn't to battle, or isn't feeling well. I could also just tell her the truth…but for some reason, that sounded harder than even saying no.

"Well…I guess so. What harm could I do?" I accepted lamely, hoping I hadn't gotten myself into something I would regret.

The next day after school, I told Grandmother that I was taking Riri out for a walk, hoping she wouldn't notice my nervousness. She gave me a long look (which must have meant that she did notice), and then nodded. "Don't be out too late," she reminded me.

I nodded, not really sure how long the battle would last, and went out. I took the quickest route to Saeko's home, trying to make up for the time that I would lose in the battle. She was waiting for me outside when I arrived.

"Hey, Shirona!" she called, waving. "Come around into the backyard."

She turned and started walking around the house. I followed her, Riri tottering behind me. When we came around, I saw a mostly featureless expanse of grass.

"This is where I practice," she said. "It's pretty good for basic battles."

At the time, I didn't know what about it made it good for battles at all, let alone for beginners. Now I can tell you that the advantage comes from the lack of obstacles and the relatively flat terrain. When pokémon and trainers with little or no experience are battling, it's best for them not to have any obstacles in the way, and for the ground to be relatively easy to navigate. Better trainers can use objects like rocks or trees on the field to their advantage, but they tend to get in the way of rookies.

"Let's get started." Saeko fished a funny object out of her pocket. It was some sort of ball, like the kind Riri plays with, except that it was red on the top and white on the bottom. There was a button on it too, and when Saeko pointed it at the ground and pushed it, there was a flash of red light, and suddenly her shinx was standing in front of her.

Needless to say, I had never seen a pokéball in use before. I stared bug-eyed at the sphinx, then looked at Saeko. "Wh…what was…?"

She laughed, not unkindly. "You've never seen a pokéball before? You store your pokémon inside of them."

"Store…?" I didn't like the sound of that at all. It made them sound like the crops you harvest and put away until you need them, not like living things. "Why would you do something like that? And how does he fit in there?"

"I don't know, it's just what you do," answered Saeko lamely. She considered, then added, "And I don't know how he fits. My mom explained it to me, but I don't really get it either."

Riri looked up from where he had been busily sticking his snout into the grass and looked at Saori's shinx. The other little pokémon bounded over to Riri to inspect him. They circled around each others, sniffing. Their behavior didn't seem aggressive at all to me; just curious.

"So," Saeko asked me at length, "What kind of moves does your riolu use?"

"Er, I don't really know," I answered. "What do you mean by 'moves'? Are those things they do in battle?"

"Yeah, pretty much. If you don't know that, I guess we should start with the basics, huh. Do you want to teach your riolu how to do some moves?"

"Sure, that would be great," I almost sighed with relief. I would feel a lot less guilty about starting training with her if we weren't actually battling. I realized that it didn't matter what part of it I did: if it was pokémon battling, it was pokémon battling, and that was wrong. And I had lied to my grandmother.

But I managed to convince myself that trying some moves out wouldn't do any harm. Whether I would regret it later or not, I would see soon.

In retrospect, I find it amusing how little foresight I exhibited then.

Saeko decided that Riri should learn to use a move called "Quick Attack". It's a very simple move, she explained, but it can be used in many different ways: to ram into the opponent at high speed, to avoid their attacks, and to trick the opponent into attacking you and then dodging. Of course, there are many other uses—while basic, it's one of the most versatile moves in battling. However, these were all of the uses Saeko knew.

First we worked on speed by itself. I ran alongside Riri to get him to run faster, and Saeko suggested that when he stopped, we could use a treat to entice him. We used that idea, although it turned out to be a little messy in the long run, because Riri began to expect a treat after every battle.

Then we worked on dodging. Saeko's shinx would jump at Riri every once in a while and Riri would jump out of the way. I would tell him, "Good boy!" whenever he did that, and he was getting a little faster towards the end of the day. Then he started slowing down.

"I think Riri's tired," I pointed out to Saeko a few hours after we had started.

"You're right. We should stop for now." Saeko held out the pokéball and called out her shinx's name. It turned to look at her and she pressed the button, recalling it inside. I still didn't like pokéballs.

"I should be going home now anyway. Grandma didn't want me to be out long," I added, still feeling guilty. If anything, the guilt was worse now, because I had actually been enjoying the training. Grandmother was normally kind, but if she found out about this, I would be skinned alive.

Saeko nodded understandingly. "You wanna do this again sometime?"

"Uh…sure." _Oh no. I shouldn't have said that._ But what could I have said? Saeko knew I had enjoyed myself. If I had refused, she would know something was up. It wouldn't be fair to tell her that I wasn't allowed to do this. And if Grandmother ever found out, it was her and my business. I wouldn't let Saeko get involved.

We said goodbye. Saeko went into her house through the back door, and I picked up Riri and started walking home.

"How you doing, buddy?" I asked him as I walked.

He made a tired little noise, and looked up at me. He looked happy, though. Maybe everyone was right, and pokémon naturally _did_ enjoy battling. I wasn't sure if I was ready to believe that, but my mind was becoming more open almost without me realizing it.

I put him down when we got close to home, and he tottered behind me. I opened the door once we were at the house and let Riri go inside as I pulled off my shoes.

"Grandma, I'm home," I called. I set my shoes down and stepped onto the floor as Grandmother came out to see me.

"You were out a while," she commented. I could tell she knew something had happened, but she didn't look too concerned. I had timed my absence pretty well, at least.

"I ran into Saeko while we were out walking," I lied, shocked at how easily it came out. "We talked for a long time. I came home when I saw Riri getting tired."

"Well, that's good."

I stifled a sigh of relief. She didn't know anything yet. In the future, I would have to be careful. If she found out, things could get very messy.


	4. Chapter 3

I apologize for the excessive wait. Hopefully the writer's block that delayed this chapter will leave me alone while I'm writing Chapter 4.

* * *

Over the next few months, I continued to meet up with Saeko without my grandmother's knowledge, training Riri with her. Although I was beginning to really enjoy myself, I couldn't shake the guilt I always felt when Riri battled her shinx. I realized quite well that the guilt was a good thing—it meant that I still had a conscience, despite what we were doing. Even so, it was thoroughly unpleasant, and I was split between it and the fun I always had. The mixed emotions pulled at me from the inside and left me feeling weak when I left.

On the other hand, Riri, who knew nothing, seemed to be having the time of his life. The way he battled with shinx seemed more like play then fighting. Even though he put his all into the battle, he somehow didn't act as aggressive as I had expected he would. His behavior was much like when we used to play tug-of-war with the sweaters I'd outgrown.

"Do you know the rules?" Saeko asked on the day we decided to have our first real battle. Riri had been antsy earlier that morning, so Saeko decided that we should try a real battle to work off his excess energy. I gave in, knowing that it was probably what Riri wanted to do.

"I only know the ones you've told me so far," I answered, having had no previous experience with battling, even though Trainers came through almost daily anymore.

"Well, let's see," Saeko began. "It's pretty simple. You just tell your pokémon to use whatever move you want it to use, and whichever one goes first is up to how fast they are. And then you lose when your pokémon is too tired to battle anymore. You have to call your own loss, though, because otherwise your pokémon gets exhausted and might get really hurt. You have to be careful and pay attention."

That made sense to me. It should be the Trainer's responsibility to know when their pokémon isn't doing well. I was already starting to like the sound of a battle—it was more humane than I thought. "But what happens if you don't notice?" I asked.

"Uh, it's kind of hard not to notice, but I think the referee has to call the match off. Your opponent isn't allowed to call your bluff," she replied. "But we don't have a ref, so pay attention, OK?"

"Of course." I was so worried about how Riri would end up that my actual concern was whether I would call my loss before the battle was done. I would just have to think carefully.

"OK, go get 'em!" called Saeko to her shinx, who ran up in front of her. It went down on its front paws, as if it was getting ready to play, its short tail wagging back and forth.

"C'mere, Riri," I said, and Riri walked up in front of me, looking inquisitively at me. I knelt down in front of him. "See that shinx over there?" I pointed. "He's your friend, right?"

Riri cocked his head and pushed his ears back a little, listening.

"Do you remember how you've been training with him? You're going to do a battle now. It'll be like that. Does that sound fun?"

Riri just turned away from me and went down on all fours also. Saeko called to me, "You can start if you want."

"OK," I replied, not really sure what to do. "Um, Riri, let's do a Quick Attack on shinx."

Riri responded immediately, lurching forward at Saeko's shinx even faster than when we trained. Riri's opponent's tail suddenly straightened, stiffly erect.

"Denki, get out of the way!" yelled Saeko to her shinx. Denki jumped aside, quickly, but not fast enough to avoid getting rammed in the side by Riri's hard head. I almost gasped at the sight of the impact. Denki reeled to the side, but caught himself quickly and shook himself, as if he had been sprayed with water.

"Try Quick Attack again," I told Riri. Riri stood up and started running at Denki again, ears flying in the wind.

"Intercept with Tackle!" ordered Saeko. Her shinx started bounding towards Riri also, not quite as fast.

I was horrified. "Are you crazy?" I yelled at Saeko. She opened her mouth to defend herself, but before she could say anything, Denki and Riri collided. I managed to stop myself from screaming, but I winced, and Saeko noticed my alarm.

"Don't worry, they'll be fine!" she reassured me. "Just watch."

The two pokémon stumbled away from each other, clearly very dizzy. Riri had to plant himself on all fours to keep his balance. But after a few seconds, they were up and rearing to go again. Riri turned his head to look at me. His expression seemed to ask, _How was that? I did great, huh?_

I was so stunned, I almost didn't notice when Saeko told Denki to use Charge and then tackle Riri again. I _did_ notice when sparks started going through the shinx's fur as it ran towards my riolu again, head down. "Get out of the way!" I exclaimed, but I was too late. When they collided, sparks flew from Denki's body to Riri's. My little blue pokémon yipped loudly and bounded away to rub his head against the ground in an attempt to get the sparks out of its fur.

"I think that's enough for today," I said, voice quivering a little as I kneeled down again and clapped my hands. Riri came over to me. He saw the concern in my face, and licked my hand reassuringly. Then he went back over to play with Denki.

"Are you sure? Riri looks pretty much OK to me," observed Saeko, crossing her arms over her stomach and leaning back.

I replied, "Well, it was our first battle."

"_Our_ first battle? You tired too?" she teased, grinning widely.

I sat down and watched Riri and Denki play, running around and batting at each other. Now that the battle was over and my half-panic had faded, I realized how exhilarating the battle was. It was almost if the Trainer and pokémon were experiencing the same thing. I couldn't explain why I felt this way, but the thrill of battle was addictive, and I wanted to go at it again.

Today, though, we'd done enough. I made arrangements with Saeko to come over again next week and headed home with Riri. Part of the reason I didn't want him to get too beat up is because Grandmother would have noticed. Of course, the main reason was that I was too attached to him to let him get hurt. If I was going to keep battling, I had to get over that at least enough to let him have some fun.

***

Saeko and I continued training together for quite some time. I found that I was enjoying the battles as much as Riri was, which sometimes made me less guilty about the battles, and sometimes more so. I didn't know if Saeko could tell how I felt, but I never told her that I wasn't actually allowed to do this. I felt like I would be putting too much pressure on her by letting her know. And yet, I felt dishonest for not telling her what was going on. I was torn.

Part of the way I eased my guilt was by taking walks with Riri as often as I could. That was the excuse I used whenever Grandmother asked me where I was going, so by actually going for walks often, I felt like I wasn't deceiving her as much.

On one such walk, our route took Riri and I past the town's central cave. Since the time Grandmother had shown me what was in there, I had only been inside once. It had never occurred to me that there could be anything in there except for the drawings on the walls. The place seemed to me as if it were separate from the outside world, suspended in time and space forever.

For this reason, it came as a shock when Riri stopped in front of the cave and began growling, the fur on his back bristling dangerously. I stopped in my tracks and peered into the cave, heart pounding in my ears, but saw nothing but empty blackness. What could he sense that I couldn't?

"Riri, c'mon, let's go," I called, my voice sounding frightened and ridiculous to my own ears. He didn't move an inch. I approached him and put my hand on his back, asking what was the matter, he only whined in response, ears pushed back. I listened too, but heard nothing; even the breeze that pushed the tops of the trees was light enough not to make a sound.

When Riri still wouldn't moved, I stood and suddenly felt the need to find out what was bothering him. Cautiously I took a few steps towards the cave and turned to him. "C'mere, boy, let's go inside."

This time he looked up at me, still quivering; I moved back some more and he began to follow me. He started to lead the way, probably in the direction of whatever he had notice. I followed because I had no intention of letting him get lost. Every once in a while I would look over my shoulder at the entrance; the light got dimmer and dimmer as we got farther away, and starting to feel nervous, I decided that I would stop Riri before we got out of sight of the exit.

Then I realized that Riri had already stopped. Looking past him, I could almost see what he had been chasing: there was something in front of us, small and with some sort of fin on its head. Quivering, Riri barked at it. I kneeled down and tried to shush him, but the thing was already moving towards us, and as it came closer I could see its features: it was covered in scales and had short legs and sharp teeth. My fear dissolved when I saw the way it waddled towards Riri and let him sniff it. Riri, too, seemed to relax.

I rushed home to tell Grandmother what I'd seen. She told me that the pokémon I'd seen was a gible, and that I was lucky that it didn't try to bite me. I simply thought "gible" was a funny name.

When I went back the next week, I couldn't find the gible. I thought perhaps it was deeper back in the cave, but I didn't have Grandmother's lantern, and I didn't want to get lost. To my disappointment, it was a long time before I saw it again.

***

Around this time, I began to notice Riri's intelligence in different ways. I was beginning to talk to him like I would to a young child, rather than a pet who didn't understand my language, and in return he became more responsive. Gradually it became easier for me to figure out what his attempts at communication with me meant. Riri was much smarter than I had given him credit for when I was younger.

Grandmother seemed to notice, but it made her happy. Of all the pokémon the people of Celestic had integrated into their culture, riolu and lucario were two of the most prominent; and while their populations were dwindling somewhat in my childhood, my mother knew their kind well. Riolu have a special knack for making their feelings known to humans, and understanding those of humans. The fact that this connection was happening between my riolu and I meant that we were bonding. This relationship was a hallmark of our culture, and Grandmother had been waiting for this time.

Of course, I didn't know most of that at the time. I eventually came to suspect that the change might have had something to do with our battles. As it turned out, I was right.


End file.
